unbe

verb — 2 senses

unbe

verb

Etymology From un- + be.

1

No past, Poetic, Rare To deprive (someone or something) of being; to make nonexistent.

2

No past, Poetic, Rare To lack being; to be nonexistent.

  • I cannot bear my fate as writ, / I'd have my life unbe; Would turn my memory to a blot, / Make every relic of me rot, / My doings be as they were not, / And what they've brought to me!1901, Thomas Hardy, Poems of the Past and the Present, Edinburgh & London: Ballantyne, Hanson & Co., page 234:
  • There is a saying that unseen is as good as unbeen; but in this case it was otherwise—unseen, Master Malrubius was more palpably present than ever before.1980, Gene Wolfe, chapter XXXIII, in The Shadow of the Torturer (The Book of the New Sun; 1), New York: Simon & Schuster, →ISBN, page 280:

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — list of authors.